The Songweaver's Vow

by Laura VanArendonk Baugh

  Hel turned her eyes on Euthalia, one blue and beautiful, one dull and dried and unseeing.

  Euthalia swallowed hard against the mingled nausea and horror which threatened to choke her.

  “I greet you, godswife,” said Hel, and her voice was dusky and piebald too, rich and rasping. “What brings you to my hall, when you are not yet ready to join it?”

  Euthalia’s tongue refused to move. “I—I….”

  Hel pursed her lips, as if accustomed to this hesitation, and took a drink from her horn.

  There were two figures on either side of Hel’s great chair, and Euthalia knew each of them. Baldr stared down at his bowl of gruel, uninterested in the newcomer approaching them. The other figure was Nari, Sigyn’s younger son, sitting and staring out at the hall as if he were not seeing Euthalia or anyone else in it.

  Hel followed Euthalia’s staring eyes. “Do you know my brother?”

  Euthalia nodded slowly. “Not well. I know his mother. I saw him only—only once.” Only in the moment that he died.

  Hel reached out to brush the boy’s shoulder. “I knew my own flesh when he came to me,” she said. “His mother is not my mother, but we share a father, and so I have kept him here in a place of honor with me.”

  “You did not know your father had taken a—human wife?” Her voice made only the smallest stumble over the word.

  Hel shrugged one shoulder, tearing a bit of flesh further to expose a stark white tendon. “What has the living world to do with me? All will come to me in the end.”

  Then she did not know. She did not know about her father Loki, her brother Fenrir, Thor’s attempt to kill her brother Jörmungandr…. She did not know.

  Euthalia’s heart quickened. “Let me tell you why I have come, Lady Hel.”

  Hel gestured with her skeletal fingers. “Do.”

  Euthalia took a breath. “I am the wife of Vidar, son of Odin. I have been separated from my husband by a curse which distorts his image to all who love him. I did not respect his wish that I not look upon him, and so he has fled me. I travel now to find him and break the curse.”

  Hel nodded in acknowledgment. “I know this much, for did I not greet you as a godswife when you entered my hall? But your husband is not here, so you seek here in vain.”

  “I did not think to find him here,” Euthalia said. “I came here to ask for your help for your father.”

  Hel’s head shifted to one side, as if fixing her good eye on Euthalia. “Yes? How so?”

  Euthalia looked at Nari, wondering if the boy would speak, but he only stared ahead at the hall. Euthalia swallowed. “Odin changed Nari’s brother Narfi to a wolf, and he killed Nari. Odin then used Nari’s intestines to bind Loki to three rocks, where he is tormented constantly by a serpent with burning venom. All this was done in return for Baldr’s death.” She pointed at Baldr, who was listening now with visible interest.

  “Then I am avenged,” Baldr said, and he grinned.

  Nari’s eyes shifted to stare at Euthalia. She looked back at him, and slow emotion came into his flat face, a recalled horror.

  Hel looked between her two guests. “Is this true?”

  Baldr shrugged. “It is no secret that there is bad blood between Loki and me, or many other of the Æsir and Vanir.”

  Hel’s expression did not change. She turned and looked at Nari. “Is this true?”

  Nari’s eyes filled with tears, and his face crumpled. “Narfi—it wasn’t Narfi—he wouldn’t—”

  Hel nodded, as if hearing a suspicion confirmed. She reached to embrace the boy, a comfort of rot and bone, and he leaned into her black and white body, shivering as he at last faced his death.

  “And is my father indeed bound?” Hel asked Euthalia over Nari’s bent head.

  “Yes,” Euthalia said. “In a cave, in Midgard.”

  “Then we will go to him,” said Hel. She looked down at Nari, clinging to her. “I must go to our father, and then I will return. When I come back, there will be much to do, and you will have many guests to greet. Do you understand?”

  Nari did not understand, but he nodded, and after a moment he released Hel. “I will wait for you,” he said.

  Hel kissed the top of his head with desiccated lips. Then she rose from her chair, revealing a leg as rotted and bony as her arm, and drained the drinking horn. She strode from behind the table. “Bring my horse.”

  A gnarled and bent servant limped into the hall, leading a three-legged pale horse which limped alongside, so they appeared like mismatched wheels. They made their painful way up the aisle, slow and halting.

  Hel went to them and mounted the horse. Then she looked at Euthalia. “Show me the place.”

  Euthalia shook her head. “I do not know the way from here.”

  Hel put out her hand. “Death always knows the way,” she said. “You need only say where. Take my hand.”

  Euthalia stared at the hand, intact but with mottled skin and the soft look of rot, and she made herself think of Sigyn, cupping venom away from her husband’s face and eyes. She took the hand, flinching only a little when the flesh gave beneath her grip. Hel pulled Euthalia behind her on the horse, which shifted uncomfortably with the weight and imbalance. Euthalia wondered if it would collapse beneath them.

  “Now think of the place,” ordered Hel.

  Euthalia closed her eyes and saw it, saw Loki bent backward over the rocks, saw Sigyn’s arms trembling with the weight of the bowl but unwilling to remove it until the last possible moment.

  “Good. We will go.”

  The crippled horse surely could not carry them, Euthalia thought. But then Hel turned the animal’s head toward the door, and the pale horse leapt forward with blazing speed, skimming through the lean tables and plunging through the narrow door of the hall to the dark world beyond. Hel guided it around the longhouse and headed south. Euthalia clung to Hel’s waist, all slick flesh and bone too near the surface, and tried to think of none of it.

  Narfi, she realized. She had not seen Narfi in the hall. Hel had said she recognized her blood, and she had not kept Narfi with his brother. That meant Narfi was still alive.

  The thought thrilled her for a moment, until she had to close her eyes and clench her teeth against nausea as the horse whirled up Yggdrasill at dizzying speed and Hel’s torso squelched and shifted within Euthalia’s encircling arms.

  They burst free of the dark confines of Helheim and into the open air, and Euthalia gasped for it, quenching a thirst she hadn’t known she had. Now she could taste the foulness of Hel’s body more than ever, and she closed her eyes and moaned.

  And then the horse slowed, and Euthalia opened her eyes and saw trees passing on either side of them, still too quickly to be normal. They turned, clattering over broken limestone karst which should have shattered the legs of any horse, and finally halted at the entrance to a cave.

  Euthalia slid to the ground, legs shaking, and braced one hand against the hip of the pale horse. It gave before her weight and staggered, precarious on its three legs. She caught herself and the horse recovered, standing before the cave with head lowered as if it could not walk another step.

  Hel dismounted and turned to the cave. “Let us find him.”

  Euthalia followed Hel inside. They had no light, but the cave seemed to lighten around Hel as she walked, the underworld recognizing its queen.

  Sigyn noted them coming. “Who’s there?” Her voice was wary, haunted, exhausted.

  “Hel has come,” Hel answered. “Father?”

  “Hel!”

  It was the voice of a hopeless man suddenly experiencing joy, and Euthalia’s throat closed with the sound of it. Hel moved forward and then stopped suddenly, looking over the scene: the three broken stalagmites, Loki’s arched body, the acid-scarred floor, worn deeper now than Euthalia remembered, Sigyn’s extended arms and the half-filled bowl.

  Sigyn stared back at them, her eyes jumping between Hel and Euthalia, a step behind. “Hel,” she repeated, half-whispering.


  Then Hel strode forward and reached down to the ropy intestines which bound Loki, extending her skeletal hand to touch the middle strand. As Euthalia watched, the stretched tissue began to rot, blackening and softening. Loki began to laugh, a fierce, high laugh which chilled Euthalia’s blood, and then he flexed against the rotting flesh and it pulled apart. He jerked upright and leapt away from the rocks, stretching his arms and laughing still.

  Sigyn set the bowl on the abandoned stone, and then she rushed to Loki, arms open. “Loki! Oh, Loki! You’re—”

  He shoved her away, hard enough that she fell back against one of the broken stalagmites. “No,” he said firmly. “I will not let you sway me. I have work.”

  She stared at him, eyes wide, mouth agape.

  Loki turned to Hel. “Have you my army ready?”

  “I have everything you require, my lord,” said Hel without looking at the stunned woman. “All awaits you.”

  Loki did not look back at Sigyn. “Let’s go.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  Euthalia looked at Sigyn, but her once-friend did not seem to see her, staring into the darkness after Loki. Euthalia wanted to go to her, but Hel was leaving with Loki, and they were her final chance to find and help Vidar.

  She ran after them, calling, but she heard no response. She followed the glow of Hel’s travel and exited the cave shortly behind them. Hel was mounting her pale three-legged horse, and Euthalia ran to her. “Let me ride with you!” she cried, knowing she sounded rude and desperate but unable to stop herself.

  Loki crouched low to the ground and then leapt high into the air, folding his knees and arms at the peak of his jump so that he became first a tucked ball and then unfolded as a falcon. He beat wings against the air and rose away from the cave, moving fast.

  Euthalia stretched out a hand to Hel. “Please!”

  Hel seemed to hesitate, but then she extended an arm, and Euthalia swung up behind her on the lean horse. They set off at the terrific pace, and Euthalia clutched Hel without regard for the rotting body, knowing that if she lost her grip now she would lose all hope of asking Loki for his help.

  They dove back into the earth, returning to Hel’s underground dominion, and Euthalia closed her eyes against the smell of Hel’s rot and the sight of the Corpse-Fence rushing toward them. And then they were making a wide turn and Hel ducked as the horse pounded through the door of Eljudnir.

  Loki swept in with them, banking once around the hall and then sweeping up and settling to the floor on man’s legs. He looked around the long tables and grinned with satisfaction.

  “Father!”

  Loki whirled to face Hel’s table and saw Nari. Instantly his demeanor changed, and he rushed to the table with outstretched arms. Nari met him halfway, flinging himself hard into his father’s embrace.

  Euthalia’s throat closed, watching them. Again, she felt she had seen past the veneer Loki wore, the heartless disguise he kept for all others. He loved his children. He was not a monster.

  He would help her.

  Baldr rose from the table, facing Loki, and Loki saw him over Nari’s shoulder. He did not move. “Save your breath, shining corpse,” he said. “You have had your vengeance.”

  Baldr looked on Loki, on the rivulet scars rippling over his face, on the boy who clung to him. “I would not have involved a child,” he answered, and it was almost an apology.

  Loki looked down at Nari. “And your brother? Is he here?”

  Nari shook his head.

  “No matter,” said Loki to Nari. “He shall be here soon.”

  “And Mother?”

  “And your mother.”

  Euthalia’s stomach tightened. “How will they come here, Loki?”

  He ignored her and turned to Hel. “I see my first ranks,” he said. “Do you have my building materials?”

  Hel led him to a storage room at the hall’s end and opened the door. An enormous pile spilled out, but it was no grain Euthalia knew. The pieces were coarse and misshapen, and as she scooped a handful she realized with sick horror: “Fingernails!”

  The pile was fingernails and toenails, thousands of them, tens of thousands of them, and Euthalia recoiled as if they could harm her. She twisted and looked behind her, and Baldr held up one nail-less hand and wiggled his fingers. She looked down the rows of tables and saw none of the dead had their nails.

  “These will do,” Loki was saying, and he seized two great handfuls and began to crush them together in his fists. Euthalia stared as he smoothed them into a pebbled plank, each nail visible and distinct within the solid piece and yet inflexible, and set it aside. Then he started another. “To work!” he called, and the dead rose from their empty tables and came to him.

  Euthalia stretched out a hand to Nari, watching beside her, and together they watched Loki mold the nails into planks and beams and then into a long curved piece which Euthalia finally recognized as a keel. A ship. He is making a ship of nails.

  “Loki,” she said, trying to pitch her voice correctly, “as I have done you a benefit by freeing you, I wonder if you could do me a benefit.”

  Loki glanced up from his work without speaking, his expression curious.

  “My husband Vidar,” she said. “He is under a curse. You warned me of it.” You told me he was a monster and prodded me into betraying him, she thought, but she dared not accuse him while she needed his help. “I need you to undo it.”

  “Undo it?” He grinned. “What makes you think I can do that?”

  “You are skilled with magic,” she said, taken aback by his answer. It had never occurred to her that he would pretend he could not. “Only just now I saw you make yourself a falcon. Surely you can return a god to himself.”

  “I shift my own shape,” he agreed. “But I do not shift others.”

  “But this is an illusion,” she protested. “He is not really a monster, he only looks like one, and only to me. I believe you can do this.”

  Loki gave the final planks to the gathered dead and crouched to mold the last of the nails into a beast’s head for the ship’s prow. “That is a powerful spell,” he said, his eyes on his work, “and it was done by a powerful worker of magic. It can be undone only by the one who did it.”

  “Then please—in return for your freedom, give Vidar his. Undo it.”

  He did not look up from his work, drawing out the jaws of some horrific creature and shaping jagged teeth from the nails. “Do you not listen when you are spoken to? Only the spellworker can unwork it.”

  Euthalia did not want to accuse him, did not want to blunt the gratitude he must feel for his release, but she had to answer. “And isn’t that you? Weren’t you the one to curse him?”

  He stopped his shipmaking and turned surprised eyes on her. “Me?” He rotated to face her, drawing his knees to his chest and clasping them. “Me?” He began to laugh, a deep, mirthful laugh that should have been infectious but instead iced her blood. “I did not work that curse,” he told her, rocking back and forth. “That is not my work.”

  “Who?” demanded Euthalia. “Who did it?”

  Loki stopped rocking and looked at her, still grinning with wild delight. “Can you not guess?”

  She came and taught the Æsir the magic of the Vanir, among whom she is the greatest practitioner. She possesses the greatest skill in seidr. If the curse can be broken, then she is the one to break it.

  “Freyja,” she breathed.

  “Freyja,” repeated Loki, grinning as if his scarred face would split. “Your mistress, whom you have served faithfully all this time, hoping for her aid to find your husband.”

  Euthalia sat down hard, dropping Nari’s hand.

  “Vidar spurned her,” Loki said, “and everyone laughed because he would not accept her only trade good. In a rage she cursed him—but only a few have experienced the curse, because love is scarce in Asgard.”

  “Freyja,” Euthalia repeated stupidly.

  “And not only did you betray his trust, loo
king upon him when he forbade you,” continued Loki, “but you went straight to the hall of the witch who cursed him and pledged to serve her. What must he think of you now?”

  Horror exploded in Euthalia’s chest, sending fractal branches all through her like expanding frost. She stared wide-eyed at Loki, unable to speak.

  Loki laughed again, a cruel cackle which cut at Euthalia’s soul. “You little fool,” he said. “You stupid little fool.”

  “But I saved you,” she said desperately, grasping for any straw to stay afloat. “Help me.”

  “I will help you in one way.” Loki pressed his thumbs into the beast-head and shaped fearsome glaring eyes. “I will end your problem. It won’t be long until you will not mourn your lost husband, because you and he and everything else will be ended.”

  Loki stood and lifted the great beast-head, carrying it to the ship which the many dead had assembled. He dropped the head into place at the prow and stepped back. “You are Naglfar,” he declared. “Ship of the Dead, may you carry us to victory and utter destruction.”

  “How ended?” asked Euthalia, getting to her feet. Rising panic tinged her tone. “How ended?”

  Loki turned back to her. “Odin said I would remain bound until Ragnarok,” he said. “And I am unbound. So let Ragnarok begin.” He placed a hand on each side of her face, trapping her, and kissed her forehead. “Thank you for your aid.”

  He turned and stepped into the ship, which rose gently into the air, filled with staring dead people. Nari ran after him and climbed over the edge. Loki gave him a long knife from the ship’s store, and the boy clutched it, grinning. The dead, including Baldr, swarmed after the ship.

  Loki pointed forward. “Let us go and show Heimdallr that we are coming.”